Thursday, July 23, 2009

Old Habits Die Hard

I didn't feel well when I woke up yesterday. I won't get into specifics, but the thought that maybe I had a parasite did cross my mind (I later decided it's something more flu related). I didn't want to stay in bed, so I dragged our big comfy chair in front of the computer, aimed the fan at my head, and caught up on the internet.

At some point I got up to refill my water glass -- as I've done a million times before -- only instead of opening the fridge, I walked to the sink and turned on the tap. My glass was half full before I realized what I was doing. (I believe my exact words were, "What the hell am I doing?") I dumped out the water, got a clean glass, and filled it with the water from the pitcher in the fridge.

That got me thinking about my writing. Right now, the majority of my work on After the Fall is editing. The NaNoWriMo mantra to "let yourself write crap" has turned around and bitten me in the tookus. (Maybe that's why my stomach is upset.) Overall I think the story is good and I have that new-story glow, but I'm spending A LOT of time reworking phrases and shuffling things around. I've added about 200-300 words per chapter, yet it's taking me HOURS to get through 5 or 6 pages.

The beauty is, I'm catching all the writerly ticks that I didn't discover until the 4th draft of The Other Side. Repetition of sentence structure, overuse of crutch words, telling... This gives me hope that those habits might die after all.

Definitely it improves! Boy, let me tell you about my first one: I got stuck and switched HEROES in it! And it was published serially, so there was no chance to edit the mess I got myself into, LOL! And it is a total mess, even I crack up at its horror!

It took me until #8 or 9 before I felt a little more comfortable, but I'm a slow learner. :-)

A little about me

I "roughed it" in Zihuatanejo, Mexico for three years with my (now ex) husband while we waited for his US visa. Well, we didn't really rough it -- we had running water & glass in the windows, but it was really hot.

He was denied in September 2009 & I returned to Michigan in February 2010, and while our story ended there, mine continues at Hoosblog and my dog, Owen, is documenting his life on Instagram.

I'm no longer posting to this blog, but I'm leaving it online so you can read about our journey. Check out the links under Posts That Explain Things to get the basics, or the tags at the bottom for specific categories.